Sect says ‘secret killings’ continue in Zaria

The Islamic Movement in Nigeria, also known as Shi’ia or Shi’ite, says the army has been secretly killing its members in Zaria, Kaduna state.

The latest crisis started on Saturday when the convoy of the chief of army staff, Tukur Buratai, was allegedly attacked by members of the sect.

An undisclosed number of persons have died since Saturday, mostly senior members of the sect, while their leader, Sayyid Ibraheem Zakzaky, has been taken into custody.

In a statement signed by Ibrahim Musa, who described himself as the president of media forum of the movement, series of allegations were made against the army.

Musa called ongoing operations “genocide”.

The statement read: “Following the brutal attack on the Islamic Movement in Nigeria by the Nigerian Army in Zaria where scores have been extra-judicially killed, we wish to state as follows:

“A source has confirmed that the Army has taken the revered leader of the Movement, Sayyid Ibraheem Zakzaky (H) from his house this morning and is receiving treatment for injuries he sustained during the attack.

“About a thousand of members of the Movement have been massacred at the moment as counting continues, but the soldiers are now busy evacuating the dead bodies to unknown destination.

“There are hundreds of others that have received various degrees of injuries that are in need of assistance that have currently been denied access by the soldiers on ground who are in a killing spree, shooting anyone identified as a member of the Movement.

“The army is deliberately exploiting religious sectarian sentiment to instigate uninformed public, some of whom are now busy killing innocent and unarmed members of the Movement at sight using local weapons.

“The Army is at present dressing corpses of members of the Movement with their military attire and snapping still pictures to probably display them as soldiers killed by the Movement during the attack as a means of propaganda, whereas it was solely an attack by the army on harmless citizens.

“The army has also stationed road blocks in Zaria picking out innocent unarmed people that look like members of the Movement and killing them in cold blood. Even today they put an army road block in Zaria to Kaduna highway near Nuhu Bamalli Polytechnic, searching for any member of the Islamic Movement. The most weired of many of such cases is that of an army road block at Dogarawa near Zaria where they killed thirty of our members traveling to Zaria yesterday Sunday.

“We wish to state here that some of those earlier declared dead through various sources might not have been killed but might be severely injured and in need of assistance.

“In connection with the above mentioned, we wish to declare as follows:

“Members of the Movement should be allowed immediate access to Sayyid Ibraheem Zakzaky (H) as a means of taming the situation from aggravating unnecessarily.

“We believe that the army is clearing the corpses to unknown locations for mass burials to cover up for it’s crime. We hereby demand unequivocally that they should release the corpses to us, so that we can give them a proper Islamic burial. The people they killed are not foreigners, they are citizens with their relatives known.

“The Army should stop the unnecessary stage management of the whole incident making it look like what it is not through false and provocative press statements, incitements and ground activities which might not augur well for everyone.

“Access to health facilities should immediately be allowed to those injured anywhere in Zaria.

“We believe that this incident is planned and executed by the government which has been looking the other way while the army was killing members of the Movement for a period of over 27 hours from Saturday on without any statement and is still quiet as the army continues with its killing spree.

“The Islamic Movement in Nigeria is a peaceful and unarmed Movement with members in every cadre of the society that are entitled to every rights enjoyed by every other Nigerian, including religious rights, whose fundamental rights have been trampled upon by the government in its claim to be fighting against violent extremism, but instead spreading violence and hatred using state machinery.

“Finally, as the Army continues its genocide on members of the Movement, with support of the government, we hereby call on peace lovers and the international community to join us in condemning the act for it is virtually ridiculous to think that the government can kill the millions of members of the Movement.”